Today's Stichomancy for Natalie Portman

The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin by Benjamin Franklin:

I took care not only to be in reality industrious and frugal, but to avoid all appearances to the contrary. I drest plainly; I was seen at no places of idle diversion. I never went out a fishing or shooting; a book, indeed, sometimes debauch'd me from my work, but that was seldom, snug, and gave no scandal; and, to show that I was not above my business, I sometimes brought home the paper I purchas'd at the stores thro' the streets on a wheelbarrow. Thus being esteem'd an industrious, thriving young man, and paying duly for what I bought, the merchants who imported stationery solicited my custom; others proposed supplying me with books, and I went on swimmingly. In the mean time, Keimer's credit

The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin

The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Sportsman by Xenophon:

seize a boar-spear, and advance; firmly clutching it with the left hand forward and with the right behind; the left is to steady it, and the right to give it impulse; and so the feet,[27] the left advanced in correspondence with the left arm, and right with right. As he advances, he will make a lunge forward with the boar-spear,[27] planting his legs apart not much wider than in wrestling,[28] and keeping his left side turned towards his left hand; and then, with his eye fixed steadily on the beast's eye, he will note every turn and movement of the creature's head. As he brings down the boar-spear to the thrust, he must take good heed the animal does not knock it out of his hands by a side movement of the head;[29] for if so he will follow

The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Waste Land by T. S. Eliot:

che morte tanta n'avesse disfatta.

64. Cf. INFERNO, iv. 25-7:

Quivi, secondo che per ascoltare, non avea pianto, ma' che di sospiri, che l'aura eterna facevan tremare.

68. A phenomenon which I have often noticed.

74. Cf. the Dirge in Webster's _White Devil_ . 76. _V._ Baudelaire, Preface to _Fleurs du Mal_.

II. A GAME OF CHESS

77. Cf. _Antony and Cleopatra_, II. ii. 190.

92. Laquearia. _V. Aeneid_, I. 726:

The Waste Land

The fourth excerpt represents the element of Earth. It speaks of physical influences and the impact of the unseen on the visible world, and is drawn from The Call of the Canyon by Zane Grey:

spoke to her in low voice: "Hello, pretty eyes!"

Carley felt a little cold shock go tingling through her. But she gave no sign that she had heard. She recognized the voice and also the epithet. Passing to the other side of the room and joining the company there, Carley presently took a casual glance at the door. Several men were lounging there. One of them was the sheep dipper, Haze Ruff. His bold eyes were on her now, and his coarse face wore a slight, meaning smile, as if he understood something about her that was a secret to others. Carley dropped her eyes. But she could not shake off the feeling that wherever she moved this man's gaze followed her. The unpleasantness of this incident would have been nothing to Carley had she at once forgotten it. Most

The Call of the Canyon